The CASCAS tour of United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland took place 25 June – 3 July 2011.
The participants were:
Mladen Koncar, Producer, Festival Novog Cirkusa, Croatia
Coline Vergez, Costume Designer, Belgium
Rebecca Westholm, Artist/Producer, Ruby Rose Productions, Sweden
Hilke Bleeken, Programmer, STAMP/Maedchenfestival/AMOS, Germany
Mithras Ljungberg, Producer, Circus Arts, Sweden
Juha Ekorre, Artist, Finland
Marta Borreguero Ribos, Manager, La Central del Circ, Spain
Niels Groenne, Artist/Director, Denmark
The tour was also accompanied by Ludvig Duregård (marketing, Subtopia, Sweden), and an additional group from Ireland:
Chloe de Buyl-Pisco, Cathal Carroll, Niamh Hanley, Cornelius Horgan and Emily Aoibheann.
Verena Cornwall (Circus Development Agency/St Patrick´s Festival) guided this adventure. Researcher Yohann Floch was also along; he will escort all of the tours, gathering interviews with participants and professionals in each country and collecting information on the venues and institutions visited. In November 2011 a book on the individual and collective findings of the project will be published.
The tour started off in Republic of Ireland, at Cork Midsummer Festival and Irish Street Arts and Circus Network. It went on to Waterford Spraoi Creation Centre, and then to Duffy´s Circus in Dublin, to finish up the Irish part of the tour in Belfast at the Beat Initiative Headquarters. The group continued to Scotland: first to Glasgow where they visited The Briggait Centre, Nono and the planned new National Centre for Dance, Physical Theatre and Live Art, meeting with Scottish circus and street artists – all hosted by Articulation. Then the tour went south, via Blackpool Tower Circus, to Cardiff and the headquarters of NoFit State Circus in Wales. The tour bus then headed towards Bristol, where the participants visited Circomedia, The Paintworks, Wooky Hole and The Albany Spaces – this time hosted by Theatre Bristol. Finally the tour went to Hat Fair Street Theatre Festival in Winchester, and ended at The Roundhouse and Circus Space in London.
In each location the tour aimed to engage with those working in and with street arts and circus, therefore as well as formal “closed sessions” solely for the tour members, there were also a variety of “open engagement sessions” planned for “tour joiners.”
